1. Field of the Invention
This invention is in the field of printers such as electronic or electric printers, adding machines, calculators, word processors, typewriters and the like for producing braille characters and for producing printed characters upon the same recording medium, the braille characters which are designed for the use of the blind being generally embossed in a 6 dot pattern wherein the dots consist of holes or indentations corresponding to holes.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The prior art of printing for the blind by machines creating braille dots have been known for almost 100 years and improvements in braille typewriting machines for the blind have evolved during the past 100 years to develop 6 pin elements supported on a typing base for extension and retraction in response to controlling keys for the type heads.
However, in the prior art we are not aware of any patents which provide for the extension and retraction of pins which are located within the platen itself and disposed along the surface of the platen in a direction parallel to the central axis of the platen and at the same time providing solid regions on the surface of the platen for the reception of printed characters from the standard keyboard of the typewriter, word processor, calculating machine, or the like, to provide a simultaneous side by side printing of the braille characters and the printed characters.